The effect of social studies project fair on attitudes to social studies lessons and students, teachers and parents? interviews about the process

The purpose of this research is to determine whether Social Studies Project Fair which was made within the scope of Social Studies lesson at secondary 6th and 7th grades have an impact on students attitudes towards Social Studies lesson. Additionally, it is to put forward the views of students, teachers and parents who has taken in charge in the project about Social Studies Project Fair which was applied for the first time in Turkey and to help that the other practical project fairs will be performed in the future according to those opinions.The participants of the research consist of experimental group (80 students), 80 control group (80 students) from Ahmet Zeki Atalay, Ahmet Ziya Yazıcı, Çatak, Karşıyaka, Kasımlı, Merkez and Mollabey Secondary schools at 6th and 7th grade in Alaplı district of Zonguldak province in the first and second period of 2011-2012 educational year, 10 Social Studies teachers in these schools and 40 parents who had attended the project fair.In the research, explanatory -sequential mixed method with the combination of quantitative and qualitative research method was used. In the quantitative size of the study, semi-experimental design which is one of experimental research was used. While the experimental group was preparing for 3 months for Social Studies Project Fair, the rest of the students were applied the programme according to current curriculum.In order to help the work of the project, "Social Studies Project Fair Teacher's Guide", "Social Studies Project Fair Student Guide", and "Social Studies Project Fair Jury Manual Guide? which were prepared by taking the advantage of especially abroad applicants, were by the researcher.In the research ,?Attitudes Toward Social Studies Scale " was applied to both groups as pretest and posttest. The data obtained were analyzed by being used SPSS 20 program. Statistical meaningfulness level was taken as 0.05. According to findings from the quantitative part of the Social Studies Fair, it is concluded that the participation to Social Studies Project Fair improve students? attitude towards Social Studies lesson.In order to obtain the views of the students and parents, "Student Interview Form", "Teacher Interview Form" and "Parent Interview Form" were used. Experimental group students (40 students) and parents (40 parents) who were interviewed were determined according to the method of the simple random sampling. The views of the teachers (10 teachers) who were participated to fair were also obtained. As a result of analyzes obtained from interviews, the experimental group students, the parents of these students and student teachers improved their attitudes about Social Studies Project Fair.At the end of the study, what the practitioners should take into consideration in the Social Studies Fair and recommendations for future research were proposed.